I took a drive today through the Hunter's Point area of San Francisco. For those of you unfamiliar with this area, it's essentially a massive abandoned Naval area in the southeast corner of San Francisco. Heavily industrial, it is slated for a complete rebirth by the development of an entire mini-city on the old Naval base. More information here: Wikipedia and Project Website.
It was incredible to drive through this area that's so large yet completely uninhabited. Hundreds of ghost buildings loom all around, the old train tracks still exist for transporting material around the site and the docks are littered with old, barely floating ships. It is for sure a land that time forgot. The experience was very similar to the opportunity I got to tour the Mare Island Naval Shipyard which I wrote about a few years ago.
More than my not-so-secret love of old buildings, what really impressed me about this simple drive through Hunters Point is that San Francisco is far from built out. When I first wanted to get into development, my father-in-law asked me why the hell I wanted to do that here in San Francisco. As he put it, "Isn't all the land already built on?" My answer was that even though the land may be spoken for, San Francisco has been in a constant state of renewal for 150 years. I'm sure people thought it was built out in the 1960's. There still exist opportunities, especially in area like Hunter's Point, for renewal and remaking.
I think one of the best parts of San Francisco is this ability to have history and modernity co-exist peacefully. While I am a huge fan of converting and upgrading places like Hunter's Point or Mission Bay I still believe the architectural character of old San Francisco is incredibly important to what the city is. This is a city that will always be in flux, in all parts of the city. Not unlike after the 1906 earthquake, San Francisco consistently rises from the ashes (or dust) to redefine itself while at the same time keeping that which makes it uniquely San Francisco.
THAT city is where I want to build.
Jared Willis
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